PlayStation Plus: Sleeping Dogs Joins the Instant Game Collection

Welcome to the PlayStation Plus preview for May! Read on to see what’s coming to the Instant Game Collection this month, as well as this week’s discounts.

Please extend a warm welcome to Square-Enix’s thrilling crime drama Sleeping Dogs, joining the Instant Game Collection tomorrow! You’ll also find a sweet discount on the award-winning indie, Papo & Yo. There’s more where that came from, so read on. As always, let us know what you think in the comments.

May Preview

The following games are slated to be free to PS Plus members through the Instant Game Collection in the month of May.

Sleeping Dogs (PS3)

PSN Price: $49.99, Free for PS Plus members

Welcome to Hong Kong, a vibrant city whose exotic locations hide one of the most powerful and dangerous criminal organizations in the world: the Triads. You play Wei Shen, an undercover cop trying to take down the Triads from the inside. Heralded on several Game of the Year lists, this version of Sleeping Dogs comes with not only the full game, but also 3 premium DLC packs including the Retro Triad Pack, the Red Envelope Pack, and the Street Racer Pack.

Knytt Underground (PS3, PS Vita – Cross Buy Enabled)

PSN Price: $14.99, Free for PS Plus members

With an array of thrilling quests, unique zen-like gameplay and plenty of dynamic characters to meet and guide you on your adventure – Knytt Underground delivers a captivating and unparalleled experience. Download today and begin your journey to ring the six bells of fate and save this vibrant and enchanted underground world before it’s too late.

Germinator (PS Vita)

PSN Price: $9.99, Free for PS Plus members

Germinator twists the bubble genre, wiping away old school match-three games. Crash germ bubbles into those of the same color. Combine and grow them until they explode in a splattering goop. Trigger power-ups to pop them all and mess up the screen. Timing and accuracy are the keys to solving puzzles and preventing the germs from rising too high. It’s a great title for all ages, and will be downloadable free in PlayStation Plus later this month.

BlazBlue: Continuum Shift EXTEND (PS Vita)

PSN Price: $24.99, Free for PS Plus members

BlazBlue: Continuum Shift EXTEND is the definitive version of the Continuum Shift series, which includes character balance tweaks, a new character, Relius Clover, story modes for all previous three DLC characters: Platinum, Makoto, Valkenhayn, new modes, and improved online multiplayer! Watch for it later this month.

Pinball Arcade (PS3, PS Vita – Cross Buy Enabled)

PSN Price: $9.99 Free for PS Plus members

It’s pinball action on the go with Pinball Arcade on PS Vita. You’ll find great pinball tables likeTales of the Arabian Nights, Ripley’s Believe It or Not, Theatre of Magic, and Black Hole available from within the game. There are other tables available to download if you’re looking to augment your Pinball Arcade experience.

Leaving PS Plus In May

May 7th – Demon’s Souls

May 14th – Mega Man 9 & 10 Combo Pack

May 21st – Tekken 6 PSP

May 21st – Darksiders

May 28th – Zombie Tycoon 2

Entering PS Plus in May(in no particular order)

Sleeping Dogs (PS3)

Knytt Underground (PS3, PS Vita – Cross Buy Enabled)

Germinator (PS Vita)

BlazBlue: Continuum Shift EXTEND (PS Vita)

Pinball Arcade (PS3)

May 7th PlayStation Plus Update

Sleeping Dogs (PS3)

PSN Price: $49.99, Free for PS Plus members

Welcome to Hong Kong, a vibrant city whose exotic locations hide one of the most powerful and dangerous criminal organizations in the world: the Triads. You play Wei Shen, an undercover cop trying to take down the Triads from the inside. Heralded on several Game of the Year lists, this version of Sleeping Dogs comes with not only the full game, but also 3 premium DLC packs including the Retro Triad Pack, the Red Envelope Pack, and the Street Racer Pack.

Papo & Yo Bundle(PS3)

25% Discount – PSN Price: $11.99, $8.99 for PS Plus members

Papo & Yo is an adventure that follows the tale of a young boy named Quico and his best friend Monster, a huge beast with razor-sharp teeth and an addiction to poisonous frogs. The minute Monster eats a frog he goes into a violent rage that’s bad news for everyone around. And yet, Quico isn’t afraid to make a dangerous journey to find a cure for his best friend. As Quico, you’ll need to build your friendship with Monster by solving puzzles with his help as you adventure through a magical, imaginative world in which you can conjure solid objects from thin air. You’ll need to learn to use Monster’s emotions, both good and bad, to your advantage if you want to complete your quest and find a cure for your scary pal! This bundle also includes the soundtrack.

Remember, check back every Monday to learn when BlazBlue: Continuum Shift EXTEND (PS3)
Germinator (PS Vita), Knytt Underground (PS3, PS Vita – Cross Buy Enabled), and Pinball Arcade (PS3) are arriving to PS Plus members. You’ll also find more discounts and other exclusives that we weren’t able to detail here just yet. Remember: the month preview is subject to change.

Thanks for reading this week’s update along with the month outlook. You’ll find all the content detailed above with their Plus benefits active when the PlayStation Store updates tomorrow. Got more questions on Plus? Leave your comments below, or, if you’re looking to engage with more of the PS community, head over to the PlayStation Community Forums to discuss this week’s news more, find other topics to contribute your thoughts to, or start one for yourself. See you in the comments!

I found it Morgan, I misunderstood, it was apparently Patapon was offered free for a week in March as part of the Vita Anniversary. I’ve been waiting three months for it to show up on IGC, my bad. Well, how about doing me a solid and recommending it to the team, I’ve played all three games on PSP and would love to have one or more of them on my Vita via IGC or PS+ discount. Thanks and keep up the great work!!

Sadly, I already bought Sleeping Dogs when it went on sale in March (and got the Platinum a few days ago!) – not complaining though, as it helped me get to the next threshold for the $10 for every $50 promo. Really happy to see that more people will get to pick it up for free – it’s a great game.

Morgan I have a very important question that I probably already have the answer to, but I’m sure a lot of people here are hesitant on plus for not knowing the appropriate answer, I’ll try to word this without any PR nightmare pitfalls or snares.

Let’s say I’m a long time plus subscriber(which I am), and let’s say I downloaded something that was free with plus two years ago when it started, and go back in my download list to download said item, will it always be available to me as long as I’m a plus subscriber?, and if so… If i was to temporarily cancel my plus subscription for a year to go on a world wide vacation, and renew it upon returning a year later, would i still be able to download the once downloaded title even after said vacation etc.?

Sleeping Dogs is awesome! Definitely the best addition yet in my book. It’s something still fairly new, it’s something not everyone played, and it’s something that has a broad appeal. If Square Enix is willing to put their games on Plus, I wouldn’t mind seeing Hitman, or, dare I dream, Tomb Raider down the line too.

The rest of the stuff does nothing for me though, and I probably won’t even bother clearing space to download them. A third fighter in three months, and the sixth fighter in under a year is a little ridiculous. Have we even gotten that many shooters? I wouldn’t mind so much if we were at least getting some top tier stuff like the new Mortal Kombat or Dead or Alive 5, but what we we’ve been getting is either too old (PSP games), or too niche (Blazblue), even for a niche genre.

A few too many oddball/obscure PSN games lately too. I’d like to see more traditional stuff. Shooting. Racing. Action games. Maybe an HD PS2 game now and then. Something a little more familiar or recognizable. Besides pinball.

Thanks Morgan! Sleeping Dogs is the best PS3 game for PS+ since Vanquish! I have toyed with buying this game for a while, but have remained hopeful that it would eventually come to PS+ in the States. A combination of GTA and Arkham City has me very intrigued, with a great storyline to boot! I was also similarly pleased to see that Vita would be receiving FOUR GAMES this month in Pinball Arcade, Knytt Underground, Germinator and BlazBlue! I am looking forward to Pinball, Knytt, and Germinator, as I have not had the opportunity to play those games. Unfortunately (fortunately?), I bought BlazBlue during a PS Store sale a couple months back for $19. I have not had the opportunity to actually play it yet (got caught up with LBP Vita and Persona 4 Golden…now playing Persona 3 Portable), but I’ve heard nothing but good things. I hear that it has some very in-depth stories for its characters in its single-player arcade mode, which reminds me of Mortal Kombat. I’m not a big fighting game fan, but if true, that goes a long way towards making the game enjoyable for me. Keep up the great work team!

Wow, what an update!! Tomorrow can’t come soon enough! Also, Germinator? I don’t remember you mentioning that one on the Blogcast..so either it was a last minute addition, or you saved a bit of a surprise? Either way great work, PlayStation Plus just gets better every month. Can’t wait until next month’s line up as it will mark the 1 year anniversary of the Instant Game Collection and the 3rd anniversary of PlayStation Plus! Hope you guys make a lot of noise with the program next month!! Also, as the only fighting games I like are PlayStation All-Stars and maybe Injustice: God’s Among Us as it has characters that I actually know, but all these fighting games for Vita is a big let down for me. They are fun, but there’s too much memorization required, and I don’t have the time to learn everything. But as for new ideas of what kind of genres I would like to see in the IGC, I’d say more shooters, open-world, and racing games as we haven’t gotten very many of them. But thanks Morgan and Sony! Keep up the good work!!

Knytt Underground: I all ready own this on PC but I haven’t played it yet and I would rather play it on Vita/PS3 for the trophies so I’m somewhat happy to get it.

Germinator: I’m apathetic towards this one. I’ll probably try it but I don’t imagine it will stay on my Vita for long.

BlazBlue: Continuum Shift EXTEND: I’m a bit disappointed to have yet ANOTHER fighting game for Vita but I’ve never played a BlazBlue game before so I’m actually rather exited to try it out. This is the Game I’m most looking forward to this month.

Pinball Arcade : I’m a medium amount happy to get this one. I don’t see myself playing it too much as I prefer Zen Pinball’s style but it’s I’ll probably keep it on my Vita to play once in a while.

All in all I’d rate the free game selection this month 7.5 out of ten.

Also I’d like to note that I really want bigger and cheaper memory cards for Vita. I’m really sick of having to “Clean out the fridge” every time I want to get a new game.Cut the prices in half and release a 64GB please.

@Kedaro – yes, you regain access to the old stuff once you renew, as long as it was added to your Download List the first time you subscribed. I let my PS Plus membership lapse for a month or so once, and I was able to play everything again once I signed back up.

Another month, another fighting game for Vita. At least this one’s actually FOR the Vita, instead of being a Namco PSP fighter like we’d been getting used to. Please, for the love of all that’s holy, THERE ARE OTHER GENRES ON VITA! GIVE US ANYTHING ELSE, ANYTHING AT ALL!

Sleeping Dogs is a great deal better than the headline games from previous months, and Pinball, Germinator, and Knytt Underground are solid additions. Honestly, I might be most interested in Knytt Underground this month, though I’ll certainly be downloading everything, and trying them all out as I can.

Those asking for GTA and God of War to be in the IGC. Those games were just on sale for an obscenly low price. I bought the entire GOW HD collection for $20! If you sit around and wait for those games to come to the IGC, you’re gonna miss out on some classics…they are not coming to IGC.

We do that for the PS Store update. But since the Plus post is always a preview, I don’t want people to click off and ‘buy’ Sleeping Dogs’ when it’s not marked as free for Plus members. Know what I mean?

We do link people to it on the images with the Plus buy now buttons though.

Thanks! for responding to me, I’m pretty sure I already knew that, was just seeking an official response from Morgan or another community figurehead, I think an official response would really hit home on this, I have friends who do not believe me in the matter at hand.

And also this is great! I was gonna buy Papo & Yo next week to play over the summer for $11.99 but now it’s a few dollars off, I’m glad I waited to buy it (I wasn’t gonna be able to play it last week anyway because of Finals, lol)

Great update with Sleeping Dogs and Knytt Underground (loved the demo). However, this is one of the instances where I’d prefer a great PSP title over a weak PS Vita one since I don’t think Germinator is very good at all. Moreover, I hope we can cool down with the fighting games for a while… 3 straight weeks of fighting games is enough.

Anyway, great update. I’m glad I finally made the jump to PS Plus and I can’t wait to play Sleeping Dogs (I didn’t play it when it came out). I’m also excited for Blazblue. Great job PS! PS Plus IMO has much more value than my XBL Gold sub (I only use that to play online).

@Kedaro – Your friends doesn’t seem to trust you then. When I bought my PS3 in December of 2011 I used my free month of plus and I didn’t even realized the games expired. In October of last year I renewed for a year and was about to re-download all of the games I had for Plus for the month of January that year. If that helps another persons story with plus haha

does anyone know if the game save for the retail version of sleeping dogs is compatible with the digital version? also, if i already have the add-ons installed, will they work with the digital version or do i need to re-download them? thanks.

It’s like you were preparing us with other fighting games to finally get into BlazBlue: Continuum Shift Extend.
I would like to recieve Zero Escape: Virtue’s Last Reward.='(. And, maybe, Corpse Party =P.

@124 – I can’t speak for everyone, but the reason I’m asking for free digital versions of classics like GTA and GOW is because I already have those games on disc, but I’d love to ditch the discs and keep the digital versions.

I’m not going to pay money for digital versions of games I already own on disc, no matter how good the sale is. But I’d gladly trade my discs for downloads, once those games are added to the IGC.

Why is it that you release games like Kyntt Underground and Germinator for free when they recently came out? Sure, it’s great for people who haven’t bought it yet, but for people like me who did, it’s a waste of money. You did the same thing with The Cave as well and last year with Shank 2.

It kinda makes me hesitant as a Plus member to buy non-Plus games if they’ll just be free in a few months. For all I know, Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon will be free next month after I just bought it.

i think for all downloadable titles, when mentioned here in the Blog, you should accompany the file size as well. i know it’s mostly an estimate, but an estimate is better than not knowing at all.. especially when considering Vita titles and the limited(and very costly) space we have available…

glad to see Sleeping Dogs finally in this promotion, but im surprised the full price is still $50… but hey, that’s probably EA’s doing.. i picked it up for under $20 on PC…

and last thought, Pinball Arcade is a fine game, but add up all the table prices, it’s not so cheap… there should be a sale on those… same goes for Zen Pinball 2, which i prefer nowadays… still expensive when you add up all the tables together…